But over the last year of sailing and writing my memoir – and in particular the last three months of writing essays and notes here on Substack – I find my mind clearing. Ideas are crystallising, given shape by the creative wealth that exists here – and through the discussions with all of you who read my writing.

So in this instance I will make an exception. If you permit me, I would like to distil thoughts and ideas from the last three months of essays and notes into a few simple lessons for my own life, based on reflections from the last 20 years. It’s about the day-to-day business of living. After all, how we live our days is how we live our lives.

There is nothing new or revolutionary in these simple ideas, they are things we are told over and over again throughout life. But to me, it is in the reframing and contextualising that they gain value. Through concrete context I can understand what they mean within my own lived experience, and that is of immense value.

So here is a letter to my future self, to return to in case of despair. I know there will be future times of darkness where everything gets muddled up. Perhaps I will burn out or become depressed again. I hope these thoughts can provide some solace then.

Dear future Alex,

Life is fragile.

Memento mori. Remember that you will die. You get a short flicker of time to experience all there is. You are alive on this coalescence of space dust, alongside the infinite wealth and beauty of the plants and creatures that inhabit it.

If you somehow forget, try to recall what you once knew out on the Scottish seas: that life is brief and fragile and sublime. That perspective was one of the prime catalysts leading you to quitting your job and setting sail, and a perspective that has grown deeper roots through that voyage, and through writing. Alone at sea, carried by wind and waves alongside gannets and dolphins, the entire scope of life seemed to exist in single moments. You were everything you needed to be and could be then.

Remember this quote, that sends echoes through your soul:

“I don’t want to live the wrong life and then die.”

—from Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel.

Pay attention with all your senses

Through sailing and writing you have learned to pay attention to nature all around you, wherever you are. Return to that if you are ever lost. Pay attention to the intermingling tapestry of scents: the salt of the sea, the damp earth and meadow flowers.

Listen to the layered sounds of wind, movement, and life wherever you go. The rhythm of splashing waves and the susurrus of wind across sails soothed you to blissful sleep at sea; let it soothe you now.

And remember to look up, pay attention to both the large and the small: a splash of colour, beams of light through a canopy, an iridescent flower or the milky way across a cloudless night sky.

Appreciate the movement and grace of living creatures all around, birds, insects, mammals, and fish. Appreciate the little things that make you appreciate your day alive in this world. Don’t forget the joy it brings you.

Seek a sense of belonging

Don’t forget the warmth and value you have found in gaining a sense of belonging over the last few years. Belonging in the world, in your community, in your own mind.

It’s through appreciating the fabric of the universe that underlies existence that you found it; the cycles of water and minerals flowing from mountains; the sun-energy and nutrients that pass through us temporarily, providing the literal building blocks for all life on earth. It’s also in the way you engage with your surroundings by immersing yourself in wind, earth and water.

But don’t forget there is belonging in community and the people in your life, through sailing, writing and your friends and family. Through belonging we all become part of the same fabric.

Existing is enough

Since we are all part of the same mesh, fuelled by the same sun, made of the same cosmic dust, all we can do is exist, and by existing we are enough. There is no need to prove your worth to the universe. You are the universe. Do the gannets, dolphins or pufflings worry about meaning or purpose? They exist, and in existing they belong to earth and all there is. And so do we. Don’t wear yourself down to earn the approval of others in the hope that your existence will mean more.

You, existing, already means everything.

Live with humility, kindness and gratitude

So don’t you see that you are a facet of a crystal to which all things belong? All different, part of one whole. Remember that all living things are an extension of yourself. Through sailing it became intuitive, seeing the birds all around, and the dolphins following Kismet along. You were there, part of it all, but the same. And it fostered a sense of humility and gratitude: to feel the same, part mineral, part animal, part consciousness as all living things are.

Kindness follows. Kindness towards yourself and all the world. It is the only thing that makes sense. Within that kindness lives the help we extend to others – to all living things. Through helping and showing kindness to others, you help and are kind to yourself. And give yourself permission to ask for help and receive the kindness extended by others. After all, we are all Soulfarers.

Immerse yourself in life

Enjoy this one rare life. Immerse yourself in it, experience the world around you. Try new things. Do hard things for the challenge and enjoyment of learning. In the midst of burnout and depression, you lost your sense of wonder and desire to do things. But as you started slowly doing hard things again – quitting your job, rebuilding a diesel engine, restoring a boat, setting sail around Scotland, and writing your memoir – you found that you gained perspective and joy. Not in every moment, but cumulatively over time, if you do them because they seem worthwhile to you.

There is so much to see and experience. The world is abundant in beauty, despite all the despair and ugliness. Remember to let yourself experience it.

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I hope it resonates.

In memory of a fawn, dead.

I saw you one spring morning, taking your first unsteady steps.
Dappled light fell on dappled spots, blending you in.
Perhaps that is why they didn’t see you?
Your mother, the doe, thought you safe, hidden in the grass. 
I did too.

I observed your curious gaze all day; your day in the sun.
How strange and wondrous the world must have seemed to you. 
The singing birds and vibrant butterflies against blue skies, 
the wind-rustled leaves on trees,
the sparkling water tumbling down the creek.
A corner of a field was your universe.

Then the sound of a rattling engine shook the dew-heavy, evening air.
Steel blades through tall grass. They didn’t see you.
Now you’re dead, and I mourn the loss of a fawn,
who had a mere day to live in this rare world. 
One day on Earth; your whole life.

You still live in my mind, little fawn;
I will live for you the best I can,
feel the sun you no longer feel,
breathe in the scent of damp earth and meadow flowers.
I’ll look up at the stars at night and remember you were here.

I’m sorry.

This is unfortunately a real tragedy I witnessed, and more common than I knew. As humans we accidentally kill many wild animals, not only through traffic but also through farming and even in managing our own lawns and gardens. Luckily, through people paying attention and caring we keep improving the way these things are done. Through thermal imaging for example thousands of fawns are saved in farmers fields every year.

It’s a stark reminder of how harsh life can be, and our own responsibility to be careful. We have moved far from the natural world, and I hope we don’t forget to pay attention.

I quit my scientific post and moved back to Edinburgh, with a lot of questions still unanswered. It all went very fast. I got a job in the biomedical industry for which I was well qualified, and just like that, I had traded my dreams of academia for a corporate nine-to-five job.

Coming out of deep burnout, I needed the change of pace. I could leave work at work, I had a good salary and benefits, and I never needed to work long hours. For a year or two I convinced myself that was good enough.

I wasn’t happy, necessarily, though I felt like I shouldn’t complain. Yet something fundamental was missing. Despite developing treatments for rare genetic disorders – which on paper I thought should feel deeply meaningful – I felt like all I was doing was to feed a money-making machine. I wasn’t working on projects I had any say in. I felt detached from the world and the people I was supposedly doing this for. I was simply putting the hours in, collecting the paycheque, enriching shareholders, and going home. Rinse and repeat.

My soul was eroding. The fuel through which I’d powered my life and soul had been ambition, though it had also been that insatiable urge to prove myself that burnt me. But now the tank was empty; I had no reason, no drive – I felt more than bored.

I didn’t feel alive.

I was burning out all over again through lack of purpose. My brain still had some of its old patterns of course. It’s hard to move away from the idea that to live a meaningful life you have to do something grand that’ll leave a legacy. So I was questioning my every thought and feeling, thinking this is what a life of ‘enough’ looks like, and that I shouldn’t be ungrateful. I was afraid of reverting back to old patterns of proving myself.

But I slowly realised I wasn’t being true to myself and my own interests. I wasn’t learning, connecting, being creative, coming up with ideas and building upon them, all of which were things I used to enjoy. I began to sense that I needed to take some time to figure myself out. Maybe start writing again. But I was at the same time too afraid to give up the stability and safety I had built.

I was afraid of what it might mean to leave it all behind. Despite leaving academia, I was still doing science. There was still a small tether to my old dreams. Having spent fifteen years working for something, I didn’t want to just walk away. Would it mean I had wasted all of those years? The finality of leaving it all behind was terrifying.

The very idea felt like leaving all the safety of the shore behind, and casting off for the open sea with no idea what was in store. Maybe if I had remembered the words of Herman Melville I would have been able to do it earlier:

But as in landlessness alone resides highest truth, shoreless, indefinite as God- so better is it to perish in that howling infinite, than be ingloriously dashed upon the lee, even if that were safety!

-Herman Melville, Moby Dick

I was too scared of facing the open seas – to perish in that howling infinite – and looked to the false safety of the lee shore for so long that I forgot how to be a human, free of mind and spirit.

I was in the third burnout of my life, living in beautiful Edinburgh, Scotland, without seeing the world around me. It felt like a shadow realm where nothing was enjoyable, and I had no desire to do any of the things that used to bring me joy. I didn’t spend much time outside; I didn’t read, nor socialise much; I wasn’t writing, or sailing, or being creative in any way.

But then – through some cosmic serendipity I still don’t fully understand – a fellow burnt out sailor at a local yard gave me his sailing boat. She was sitting neglected in the yard, slowly rotting away. Her name was Kismet, meaning destiny. It still seems too good to be true. I don’t believe in preordained destiny or interventionist higher powers influencing reality, though I’ll take a gift from the universe when it arrives.

She lit a faint spark in me. Slowly – through the soullessness and turgidity of my mind – ideas started forming, and ambition started returning. But not an ambition to prove myself. An ambition to do something honest for myself. To cast off and sail into the open seas, metaphorically and literally, to find a way back to myself. To find my lost soul, and to find my humanity again.

And with that ambition I started feeling more alive again. Alive to pursue curiosity and adventure. The plan that began forming was to learn to fix up Kismet, rebuild the diesel engine, and refurbish her entirely, and then set sail. Sail as far as I had to until life made sense again.

And I did. I restored that little boat and I sailed her around all of Scotland. I spent months with bleeding, oily knuckles rebuilding a rusted diesel engine, before cruising around ancient islands and anchorages with puffins and seals as neighbours.

It was creatively challenging, and conceptually exciting. But more than anything I had time to myself, working with my hands, immersed in difficult projects. And when we sailed, I was slowly transformed. I started sensing how the slow living – the attention I could pay to myself and my surroundings, and the closeness to the natural world – shifted my thoughts and perceptions.

I found the balance I needed between ambition and self worth. I see now that I can be ambitious still. But I don’t seek validation like I used to; instead I seek connection. This ambition is quieter, not as hungry. It doesn’t define my value anymore, it just fuels my love for the world and all that it holds.

Somewhere along the way I noticed I was no longer burnt out. I felt fulfilled and content. For once, I heard the world and the wild geese announcing my place in the family of things.

And now I can look back at my life and finally see that I have always been enough. I will always be enough.

Thank you for being here and reading. Sharing this story has been a raw and incredible experience, and I feel certain I’ll come back to it for myself when things ebb and flow in life, just to remind myself of where I’ve come from. I hope it can do the same for you.

I’m in the process of trying to publish my memoir covering my journey from burnout to sailing in detail, along with the circumnavigation of Scotland. If you want to follow along, please consider becoming a free subscriber by clicking the button below. Your support means the world to me.

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A note: The line “announcing your place in the family of things” is from the beautiful poem “Wild Geese” by Mary Oliver.

Previous parts in this trilogy:

A PhD is a magnet to those of us who do well academically out of a desire to prove our worth. Academia is fuelled by the exploitation of insecurity.

Somehow, I got accepted into a highly prestigious molecular biology PhD program at Cambridge. Again, I felt the heady rush of validation. It didn’t reach the heights of getting into Cambridge the first time, but it still made me feel good. Until – yet again – it slowly faded to be replaced by uncertainty and anxiety.

I loved the creative aspects of my PhD, coming up with ideas, forming connections between concepts, writing outlines and finding shape in our world. It was like writing stories in many ways, deeply creative and rewarding in its own right. But on its own, it was not enough to sustain me. I was caught up in prestige, the idea of writing great scientific papers and delusional dreams of winning Nobel prizes.

Is that not the ultimate validation in the eyes of the world? In my heart of hearts I dreamt of that validation.

But when the reality of the long slow work of a PhD set in, that desire for recognition was not a strong enough driver to ward off the sense of failure. The dry day-to-day of science is the grinding away at results and failed experiments, and analysing half-baked data that amounts to nothing. Failure upon failure is an essential part of the process. But I compared myself to the successes around me. Someone was always doing better, publishing papers, having success. Their wins put my own failures in sharp relief.

I started feeling hopeless, like I was moving through treacle and getting nowhere. A malaise born out of comparison and high expectations. I hit a wall and in retrospect what I would now say was my first burnout. I felt inadequate. Not enough. I was horizontal on the couch, unable to work for months, a vicious cycle of feeling like shit for not doing enough, therefore too anxious to do any work, making me feel even more shit. It took the compassionate intervention of my supervisor to get out of it.

Through his non-judgemental help and unconditional acceptance I was slowly brought back. One of the things he said to me then started laying a foundation for things to come. He said: ‘The fact that you haven’t been able to do it means it couldn’t have been done.’

I forgave myself for failing. He helped me find joy in the work again and the excitement of learning and scientific creativity came back. I started writing my thesis, and in writing I flourished again. All the pieces fell into place as I wrote, and I managed to finish my PhD in a remarkable three years.

Again, the validation returned, giving me a burning drive to push higher, prove to myself that I could make it as a scientist. I was living the dream I had been harbouring for all those years. The dream of a twenty-year-old Alex with the world at his feet. I was a scientist, publishing papers, doing exciting work. So why did it not feel like I had succeeded? Why did I still not feel enough? The answer I came up with then was that it’s the reality: a PhD is a baby step, I’d have to do a postdoc, publish more prestigious papers, win scientific awards, maybe then it would feel like I have made it? I knew I wasn’t enough, because the scientific world told me so.

The answer I see now, looking back, is very different. There could never be an enough. I was chasing a ghost, an inadequacy within me that no amount of success could ever fill. But I didn’t know that.

That is the reality of academia, the scientific grind, fuelled by people like me, intent on proving their worth. For all the great achievements in the world, all the innovation, how many souls are burned, fuel to the neverending machine of constant progress, nothing ever enough?

After my PhD, in late 2020 the world was in lockdown, and I moved continents to pursue the next stage of my scientific career. You make whatever sacrifices you have to in pursuit of the dream, no matter the costs. I left my life in the UK, started doing long-distance with my partner of 7 years, and moved to a small US city in the middle of lockdown, far from family, friends, and my normal life.

In that profound isolation, compounded by a lack of progress at work, I began to spiral. Through many lonely nights of deep self-doubt I burnt my essence until nothing remained. I felt like a husk – a human without soul. In the dark depths of depression I lost my sense of self, feeling barely human. I was fragmented, disintegrating into shards of ideas, feelings and thoughts. I dreamt of escape, a hut in a forest or a boat upon the sea far away from it all. But my ambition, my insecurity wouldn’t let me leave. If I left… If I failed and didn’t make it in science I would be nothing. My whole identity, the foundation I’d created, would crumble. I was being crushed between ego and despair.

Unable to leave my house or even my bed, I felt like I was drowning in a sea of my own making.

At absolute rock bottom, feeling like I had no way out, I started therapy. I was becoming aware of the deep anxiety and insecurity within, built on a life of chasing validation. I had no idea how to navigate it and needed help.

Slowly we began shining a light into corners of my mind I had never dared look at. We started untangling a web of connected thoughts that I took to be objective reality, but were spectres and stories I had created. We started probing why I formed this way of viewing myself and the world; what it means to be a failure; how we define value. I still remember the question that slowly wormed its way into my mind, and changed the course of my life: Can you have value in absence of achievement? What’s your value to yourself? I remember my brain rejecting the premise, it made no sense. Value is based on what we do, was my simple, instinctive answer.

But the question stayed with me for months, a grating splinter in the back of my mind. One evening, as I stood looking at myself in the mirror – looking into my own eyes – a switch flipped. For a split second I saw myself from afar: a being consisting of trillions of living cells on a pebble in a small solar system, all made out of atoms forged in the hearts of stars, long dead. And it overwhelmed me in that second. Simply by existing we are enough, what else is there? We are parts of the universe like everything else, simple earthly beings. Existence is all we have to give ourselves, all we are, the only thing of value.

The feeling passed, but I had glimpsed something I had never before felt. An internal sense of worth, not based on external achievement.

It didn’t change a lifetime of patterns and emotions instantly, but it had opened the door. It allowed me to say enough is enough and recognise how depressed I was, alone in my desolate flat, fighting for a life that brought me such pain and misery.

Slowly, I accepted the idea that I could quit without losing who I was. The shift in mentality meant I could accept a different reality and begin the process of moving back home, to the UK, to my partner, and start living again.

But the questions that remained still weighed heavily. What now?

How do I give up on a dream and a career? How do I approach a life when I’m not striving and climbing, trying to make it? Is ambition always bad, should I not care at all? I had no answers, just an amorphous, terrifying future, but it glowed with a sense of hope.

Thank you for being here, and reading my words, witnessing my soul laid bare. It was through the help of others and their experiences that I realised there could be another way to look at things, so I hope sharing my experiences can help others.

Feel free to reach out with questions or comments here or through email or message, I’m always happy to answer and curious to learn.

Next week I will conclude this essay series with all that happened after I moved back to Edinburgh – trying to find my footing in a new career, burning out again despite it all – and eventually finding Kismet, the little boat that changed my life.

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Paid support option: To celebrate the launch of Part 2, I'm offering 20% off paid subscriptions this weekend as a heartfelt thank you for being a part of this journey. Your support helps me continue writing.

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Read part 1 here:

But where does it really begin? What’s the story of a life lived in pursuit of something so elusive, meaning and self worth? I could start at the very beginning, giving the details of growing up in Sweden, being the eldest child, the people pleasing from a young age – wanting everyone to like me in school and being conflict avoidant – and feeling a need to have top grades in every subject. But in some ways I think those things are a given prerequisite, and the heart of the journey can really be traced from the year before university.

My dream then was to become a scientist. I always loved the natural world, and loved learning about it through nature documentaries and school. The mechanisms of how life, Earth, and the universe all worked became a deep passion. I remember being ambitious too, wanting to do great things, dreaming of legacy, fame and achievements. About to turn twenty, I felt like the world was at my feet and I really liked the feelings ambition gave me: the sense of importance and meaning. It felt good to fight and strive for something, an ideal, a vision – to achieve. Somewhere within me I had a certainty that that was how you became a person who could be respected, a person who deserved their place in the world.

Those thoughts were deeply tangled roots, not something I was aware of. There was just this insidious feeling, sinewy and persistent, enmeshed in the whole structure: that I needed to be more than what I was; that I was not enough.

Sweden seemed too small for my ambition in many ways. So I decided to apply for universities in the UK, where better? Cambridge, Edinburgh, Imperial and UCL were my top choices, and if I didn’t get in, I’d stay in Sweden. Four choices, four versions of a future life all radically different. Who knows what each of those lives would have looked like? I only know the one I got. I’d thrown my hat into the ring and trusted destiny with my future.

Many months of revision and interviews followed, then the agonising wait for results. I was fretting, overthinking how the interviews went and what I said; I spent weeks pacing, updating the UCAS admissions portal several times a day.

Hoping.

Telling myself I didn’t care, whichever outcome would be fine, even though deep down I cared so much it felt like it took conscious effort to make sure all the atoms of my being stayed together without exploding.

Then the fateful day arrived. I remember it so vividly: sitting at my desk in my childhood bedroom, opening the email, shaking with nerves and then reading the line: Unconditional offer to study Natural Sciences at the University of Cambridge. I couldn’t believe it. I just started smiling – or laughing even – hopping around the room, little explosions of manic energy bursting out of me. It is to this day the most emotionally intense day of my life. But the real feeling underneath it all was not gratefulness or happiness. It was validation. I felt like all my doubts about myself, all the question marks, all the feelings of being an imposter evaporated with that single line. This was the evidence. This meant I was someone of worth, someone that mattered.

Again, all these feelings were undercurrents, undefined and unstated. I just felt this elation and joy as if everything was going to be alright from then on.

But of course it’s not so simple, when worth is derived externally.

I got to Cambridge, a Swede with no real understanding of the English schooling system, studying in a second language, a few years older than everyone else and with a less technically rigorous background.

And slowly doubt started slithering back, creeping in around the edges. Comparison started morphing the experience. Thoughts started telling me the things I’d used to feel, things like: I’m not quite good enough, I’m not up to scratch, there are so many others better than me, I’ll never make it. Everyone around me was sharper, more dedicated, had published papers, or knew how to code, or [fill in the blank here]. Ultimately, it didn’t matter what it was. All that mattered was that, yet again, that small insidious thought returned: I am not enough.

But my ambition remained strong, born out of a drive, a desperate longing to prove myself. I was at Cambridge after all. I would surely be enough eventually? All I needed to do was to keep climbing higher, keep achieving until one day the validation I felt when I got accepted to Cambridge would return. Right? And then I would finally be content and be able to feel like I mattered, that I deserved my place in this world.

This isn’t to say that my enjoyment of learning about the world was not genuine, or that I did not love my time at Cambridge. That deep curiosity was honest, pure and in many ways a love for the world and its underpinnings that still remains. But it was all tangled up in ambition. Being there, I defined my whole personality around science, around being intelligent. That was who I had to be, and only through success within that could I find validation in this world.

So after my undergraduate I was desperate to continue in science, to prove I had what it takes. I wanted to do a PhD. Surely if I got accepted for a doctorate, and completed it, published papers and became a real, respected scientist, surely then there would no longer be any doubt? Surely then I could finally feel like I was enough?

This is the first part of my road to burnout, and I’m sure you can see the potent ingredients brewing, the hold of breath before the spiral and collapse, as has happened for so many of us. I hope you tune in next week to see if the PhD really did solve all my problems…

Thank you for reading. Writing this has been in equal parts difficult and cathartic; I hope some of it resonates. Burnout is a multifaceted, complex slow death, and everyone’s road there is unique, but also shares many similarities.

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All of my writing is free to read, but it is sustained by the generosity of readers. If you’d like to support me, all new paid subscribers currently get 20% off here:

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Thank you so much for being here.

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Read part 2 here:

All of my writing here is completely free to read, but it is entirely sustained by the generosity of readers. If you’d like to support the journey, please consider subscribing for free, or upgrading to a paid subscription (£4/month or £35/year).

Thank you so much for being here and for keeping this journey moving.

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Introduction

About me and my publication Soulfaring.

Recovering from burnout through nature, writing, and a small sailboat

A letter of thank you to my subscribers, a welcome to new faces and gifts to new paid subscribers

Nature Writing

Stories about belonging and finding connection to ourselves and the world, through sailing and the elements.

On finding deep connection with nature through the cadence of rivers

In which I dream of deep time and belonging as I sail to the Summer Isles

Reflections on our place in the world from the Isle of Skye

A soul healing sailing voyage around Scotland where myths and legends come alive

Memoir & Mental Health

Stories from the sea and my life about burnout, my sailing boat Kismet, and sailing her around Scotland to heal.

An exploration of the relentless pursuit of external worth

The cost of a PhD – losing yourself in pursuit of a dream – burnout

My unlikely journey into sailing, and how you could do it too.

Read the prologue for my memoir on the beauty and difficulties of being alone at sea

The transformative power of a passion project and the “free” boat that saved my soul

Poems

Lyrical poems about nature, mental health, belonging and the sea.

A villanelle written as a companion piece to my essay The Soul of the Sea

An Ode to my sailing boat Kismet written in blank verse

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Thank you, thank you, thank you to all my new and old subscribers. It’s been an incredible, unexpected, transformational month. I can’t thank you all enough for supporting my writing. It’s almost hard to believe. At the start of June I had around 20 subscribers — now we are approaching 150. When I started writing here it was an unthinkable number. That’s a decent size auditorium full of people. Together we could fully crew an 18th century merchant ship!

The interactions with all of you over the last month have been nourishing, heartfelt, engaging, and interesting. I feel like I have had the chance to talk to most of you, and if I haven’t yet, I look forward to soon. I try to read and comment on what you publish and love the conversations it generates, and the life insights you have provided me with. And I love the generous, deep comments you have left on my essays. It’s been a gift talking to you all and getting to know you. It feels like a community here. A community of people who observe, feel deeply, and appreciate each other and the world, even though (or maybe because) we have faced difficult times.

The gratitude and joy of seeing something I wrote loved and quoted because it has connected with your experiences can’t be described, you are all so kind and generous. Thank you.

A Welcome to New Faces

There are many new people here, around 80 from last week alone. Thank you for joining, and a very warm welcome to Soulfaring.

Briefly about me: I am Alexander, a biomedical scientist-turned-writer based in Edinburgh, Scotland. A year ago, I walked away from my research career due to burnout and rebuilt an old, broken sailboat (named Kismet). Then we navigated the ancient, beautiful Scottish West Coast, finally unshackled. Ultimately the whole journey was a way for me to get to know myself again.

This writing journey is the extension of that exploration, of recovering from burnout, mourning the loss of a dream career, falling back in love with the world by getting closer to nature and myself through sailing.

And now I’m on a sabbatical of sorts. When I quit my job due to burnout my only plan was to sail and write until my savings ran out. I have written a memoir (of which I have shared excerpts here) which will be published one way or another, and I launched this Substack to see if anyone would be interested in my story of navigating burnout, rebuilding a sailing boat, sailing around Scotland and reconnecting with myself and nature. And it turns out these things resonate, and I’m incredibly grateful.

Launching Voluntary Paid Subscriptions (no paywalls)

I want to keep writing. It has done something in my soul that I can’t quite explain. For the first time I feel like I am exactly where I want to be. Even if it stops here, with the current subscriber count, just all of us together, this is what I will keep doing. Writing essays, working on books and engaging with this wonderful community.

But if I could do it part time, or (dare I even say it out loud?) full time, it would be a dream. So I’m turning on a paid subscription option. All my writing will be fully available to all subscribers as always. Everyone will be able to comment and engage, I’m not locking my writing behind a paywall. I’m simply turning on the option for a subscription IF you would like to support my work financially, and if you feel my writing has given you something and you want to subscribe to enable me to keep doing it the way I have been until now.

I don’t have much to offer except my writing and amateur photography. But I’ll try to make it worth your trust in me.

The subscription options are as follows:

Monthly: £4

Annual: £35 (£2.91 per month)

Founder: £200

A note for mobile app readers: If you upgrade directly inside the app, there may be additional platform fees. To get the cheapest £4/£35 pricing, subscribe through a web browser instead! Either way, you get full access to everything, and you support me equally.

Subscriber Perks

At the cost of a coffee you’ll support my writing on Substack as well as my books, and additionally you’ll get access to a paid subscribers chat called The Captain’s Quarters on Substack. The idea is for it to be a day-to-day chat where we can have a dialogue as if we were hanging out on Kismet. Within the chat are the following rooms:

• The Ship’s Library is a space to have discussions on the books we are currently reading.

• The Lounge is a place for a tea or a dram of whisky and a chat about life.

• The Navigation Desk is for discussions on the day-to-day work behind our writing projects and trying to get them published.

A paid subscription directly supports my writing. To express my gratitude for helping me keep doing this there are some additional early bird perks for those who subscribe first:

• The first 100 paid subscribers will (if they wish) be acknowledged in my book.

• The first 20 paid annual subscribers will additionally get 3 months comped (added) as a thank you gift for your support and belief in me.

The £200 Founder subscription would hugely support my work, and my gratitude to anyone who chooses it will be boundless. You will officially be part of Kismet’s crew. You have an open invitation to get out on Kismet (conditions permitting) if you are ever in Edinburgh. You will get an acknowledgement in my book as a thank you for your incredible support, and a Kismet-centred welcome package.

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Looking Ahead

I write every week, and post daily notes. All fully human made with flaws and errors aplenty, completely AI free. You can look forward to posts every Saturday about:

• Sailing, travelling and nature writing, reconnecting with nature and appreciating the slow pace of water, our place on earth, and all the beautiful creatures we share it with.

• My scientific career and how I burnt out.

• How I navigate mental health, burnout and motivation.

• Stories, books and art that inspire and make us appreciate life on a deeper level.

• Poems

And I’m sure there will be more things. For every week I write a post, I get five new ideas. Eventually I may even get around to posting about the novels I’ve been working on for years.

So thank you again for reading, for your support and for participating in this community. This feels like the beginning of something.

Fair winds,

Alexander and Kismet

The Soul of the Sea

I look out across the water from the shores of the Firth of Forth as the tide rushes in, filling the Forth with the icy North Sea. The water is opaque, unknowable, made almost obsidian by the heavy clouds, reflecting off the waves. The harbour, lined with wood, rock and black iron, is a gateway into the unknown. I stand on the brink and ponder what is to come, of entering this wild abyss. My own soul is lost to me, eroded by burnout, hollowed out by trying to contort myself to fit a life that is not for me. Maybe at sea I can find a way to rejuvenate it; perhaps if I get to know the soul of the sea, I will find a way back to myself as well.

So out towards the abyss I bear. With heavy thuds I walk down the slipway, gazing down at my feet. With every step my determination grows, as I leave my old life behind for what the sea has in store. I leap aboard Kismet, my trusted, seaworthy little ship, spurning land-based life. The strong breeze whips ropes and canvas as I set the sails, just outside the mouth of the harbour. The texture of the sea is like my thoughts: dark and foreboding.

The tide turns and brings us with it, out towards the North Sea. Eventually my mind goes silent, filled with the movements of wind and waves. The salty spray runs down my hair, stinging my eyes as I fight with rudder and sails, navigating the churning water. I clasp the wood-grained, weathered tiller handle with white knuckles, keeping us just in control as we are tossed by steep waves. The chaotic sea is vicious, straining against us, not letting us in.

I sail through moonless nights, and thick fog, unseeing, into another world. A world of myth and legend. In the dark, unseen shapes move just beyond the edge of my vision. Swirling spectres. I cannot tell if these shadows are from the unknown depths, or from my own mind. Through the dark and fog I sail until I reach the gateway to the ancient west. A world of elemental powers: water, air and earth. The treacherous soul of the sea still eludes me. Overnight the storms ease and shards of deep blue, dotted with faint stars, break through the heavy sheets of cloud.

The passage opens up before me, a great glen – a deep murky loch, bordered by weary mountains. In its dark depths, an ancient leviathan lies waiting. I set off before the break of dawn, as the creature lies sleeping, careful not to disturb her. I sail quietly, crouched down in my boat, avoiding looking over the edge into the black deep. The surface barely stirs as we glide in light winds. As the sun rises I see the distant shore, a break in the mountains. We make it through the mythic passage, Kismet and I.

In the west, surrounded by snow-capped mountains and deep sea lochs, something in the air shifts. I begin to hear the whispers of the ancient mountains, and the low rumbling voice of the sea. But they are still too faint, drowned out by my own mind. I sail past verdant isles, through narrow sounds in the shadow of jagged peaks, still searching.

Then before me approaches another trial, a boiling cauldron of water. A ship-swallowing maelstrom of legend. The Corryvreckan. The waters surge and rumble as the fierce currents thrash, a ferocious river at sea. One misstep and we drift into the chaotic gaping depths of this ancient force, empowered by the heavens. I struggle and force the tiller as I am pulled and pushed around the roaring waters, but to no avail. I am unable to control Kismet. As we are pulled ever closer to the deep thundering abyss I hear another voice ringing through the roaring water. I listen closely to the voice of the sea and the still whisper of the wind. And they tell me where to go. They guide me to the safe eddies and currents that carry us past danger.

As I reach the safe waters past this hurdle, I look out at the remote, untouched world towards the horizon. Beyond these gates all time exists as one, there is no past, no present, no future, but all here together, intertwined. As I sail, I start seeing and hearing the hum of all the different strands of time, resonant in the textures, scents and colours of this place. I become attuned to the sea, sensing its eternal, ever-moving soul, that ebbs and flows, hearing its ancient voice. Within it echoes the voice of mountains, creatures, ice and fire. A voice that sustains and also deprives. That has existed for aeons and will remain, beyond the edge of time.

Out here her voice is loud and clear. My mind eases into the rhythm of it. The winds and waves carry us with ease, as I begin to understand their cadence. I spend my days communing with water and wind, a being no longer shackled but made free. I stand upon the bow of Kismet taking it all in, as we glide together over glassy seas, accompanied by creatures that also know the soul of the sea, the sleek dolphins jumping through waves, the curious seals observing from afar, the great basking shark slowly cruising the surface, and the myriad of birds surfing invisible currents.

I remain immersed in this world until the seasons change – until the temperature drops and the voice of the sea grows cold and harsh, and the wind biting. The time comes to turn back home. Winter’s dark already begins to set in the early evenings. Cold, clear air reveals the cosmos, beyond sea, earth and air.

I sail more urgently, pushed on by eager winds, fearful of winter’s claws. I face unseen dangers all around, sharp rocks and whirlpools; dangerous currents and stormy capes. But I still listen to the quiet voices, and the sea sends me her guides to help me navigate. The lost souls of ancient mariners show me the way, their bewinged forms now soaring through air. The knowing dolphins lead me past the treacherous rocks, gliding gracefully in grey seas.

Through wind and rain I sail, past the wrathful cape, stormy and remote; past the treacherous Swelkie, faceless and churning, until once again I spot the outline of a familiar place. The welcome embrace of the Firth of Forth. Of home. As I enter the gates of the Forth – sailing past guarding gannets – a pale autumn sun welcomes me onto cerulean waters. I reach the wooden docks in the light of the setting sun, and say farewell to the sea, thanking her for helping me find a way back. I say farewell to Kismet too, my bewinged vessel. As I take my first steps back on land, back towards another life, she sits perched on the water, wings folded, resting peacefully. I return to shore made whole, a being of earth and water, finally belonging.

Thank you very much for reading. If you enjoyed this, love nature writing and are as interested as I am in the richness and the soul-healing that comes from being out at sea or amongst mountains, please subscribe below to join the community and receive the weekly newsletter..

There is now an option of a voluntary paid subscription. None of my writing will be locked behind paywalls, but if you enjoy what I do and want to support it so that I can keep writing, and keep Kismet afloat, a paid subscription is greatly appreciated.

As a thank you, paid members get access to the Captain’s Quarters (our private community chat) and a welcome package.

Subscribe now

Note: All photos by me unless otherwise stated

If you missed my companion poem that goes with this essay you can read it here:

This story is part of a set of themed essays around nature and finding belonging. You can read the other essays here:

I was at anchor under a September sun by the Summer Isles in the north of Scotland and all along the horizon the sentinel peaks of Assynt stood watch, timeless and stoic. We had spent days sailing along ancient coastlines and pebble beaches with the mountains in view. The air felt strange and heavy that night, the aurora dancing in the heavens. As I fell asleep under the stars, I dreamt of time and mountains.

#

I dreamt I was a pebble, one amongst the uncountable multitude on a beach. I couldn’t see down to the water, though I heard the lapping waves and felt the cold, salty spray wash over me. All I could see were other rocks nearby and steel-grey skies above. I watched the gulls and gannets soar beneath the heavy clouds, brilliant white brush strokes against the grey. I longed to be high above, seeing what they saw. I longed to know a world beyond this pebble beach, something bigger and better. Was it even a life to be one pebble amongst millions? I wanted to know what else was out there.

Endless years passed and I watched the seasons come and go, but nothing changed. I still longed to leave. Then one day I was picked up by one of the gulls. We rushed through air and clouds, soaring high above the sea. I saw the world around me for the first time. The rugged mountains in the distance, shrouded in cloud. The pale autumn sun gently warming. It felt as if I could almost touch the heavens if the gull were to fly just a little higher. I looked at the peaks of the mountains, envious at their grandeur. Oh! to be a mountain, planted deep in the earth, touching the clouds, overlooking the world. I felt like I could almost reach it.

Then the gull dropped me. Air rushed, the world spun in tumbling chaos as I fell down through wet, cold clouds and salty sea spray before hitting the waves.

And I sank.

I descended through the deep blue water until all light disappeared. The darkness was all-consuming. In the lonely depths I wept and mourned for the loss of my life up in the light, on the beach that was my home.

Then a voice spoke to me, rhythmic and deep as waves against rock. ‘Why do you cry, little pebble?’ It was the Ocean herself.

And I told her of the life I had lost and my dreams of leaving the pebble beach, my envy at the snow-capped mountains, eternal and tall.

Her soothing voice replied: ‘But have you forgotten?’

‘Forgotten?’

‘You were that mountain, in eons past. You stood proud then, taller than anything on Earth. You looked out at the changing world from the top of the peak before time and weather brought you down to that beach, shaping you into the pebble you now are.’

So long had passed and my memories of the distant ages had fallen away, eroded by time. All I’d known for so long was the pebble beach, remote and wild. But as the Ocean spoke I remembered the millennia I spent in the clouds, seeing sunsets and sunrises, infinite lifetimes of creatures roaming the Earth. Watching their cycles of death and rebirth.

There was solace and contentment in that memory. Belonging. ‘I remember now. I used to stand tall and proud. What a life mine has been here on this earth. I wish it didn’t have to end like this.’

‘Time and entropy will take all eventually.’

More memories surged back. The eras of splitting up and being shaped. Of finally finding rest upon that beach, pebbles together, shaped from one whole.

‘How did I forget that we were all shared facets upon that beach? Here in the dark I’m all alone.’

‘All things are as one to me, eternally cycling.’

I could sense the currents in the water and the millions of fragments of other rocks dispersed in the sea, an eternal continuity. Yet in the dark it was no comfort.

‘I long to see the heavens again, and briefly I was there, before I fell into your depths. Would you bring me back to my pebble beach?’

‘I am part of Earth as you are. I do not command the sun nor the moon; we all move together in time. But do not despair in the dark. You will see the heavens again one day.’

The darkness was all consuming and dread filled my soul, thinking of the long night ahead. Many eons alone.

‘When?’

‘With time, the earth will reclaim you. And one day, you will break the surface. You will rise up through fire and chaos, into the sky and reach the clouds. There, you will see the sun rise again, eternal in its cycle. You just have to be patient.’

#

I awoke to the pale morning sun on my face, with tears in my eyes, as we rocked in a gentle swell. We walked along the pebble beaches of Assynt later in the afternoon, and I felt like I could see all the ages of the Earth. I felt like I could see it as it once was, and how it will one day become. I felt simultaneously part of it all, and completely insignificant. I felt like a human on Earth.

Thanks for reading this essay. It is a little different in tone from my previous ones and I have enjoyed experimenting with it. It is set in and inspired by sailing to the Summer Isles and Cape Wrath in my little sailboat Kismet, which was a transformative experience and subject of the memoir I am currently writing.

A big inspiration is also a song that has become a part of me over the years, and helped me gain perspective through some dark times. It is Swedish artist Laleh’s song “Det kommer bli bra” (All will be well). In particular the lyric (translated): “I am just a pebble in the sea, things are not so bad. A couple of rings on the ocean is all we’ll leave behind.”

And that’s an encouraging thought to me.

If you enjoyed this, love nature writing and are as interested as I am in the richness and the soul-healing that comes from being out at sea or amongst mountains, please subscribe below to join the community and receive the weekly newsletter..

There is now an option of a voluntary paid subscription. None of my writing will be locked behind paywalls, but if you enjoy what I do and want to support it so that I can keep writing, and keep Kismet afloat, a paid subscription is greatly appreciated.

As a thank you, paid members get access to the Captain’s Quarters (our private community chat) and a welcome package.

Subscribe now

This story is part of a set of themed essays around nature and finding belonging. You can read the other essays here:

Before I knew the soul of the sea I knew rivers. The gentle cadence of water meandering through a landscape – its sounds, scents and patterns. This river is small, flowing gently against grassy banks and low-lying brush. Its water is deep amber, clear enough to spot rocks that redirect and perturb it slightly, creating ripples. Weeds sway lazily in the irregular currents.

I spent my time getting to know rivers long before I started sailing. Rivers have always held a certain wonder and mystery to me. The way they shift and change from rushing white water, tumbling over rocks, to calm, mirror-polished, inscrutable ponds. The way they dart and flit across the landscape, sometimes dividing, before the streams re-join in a rushing joy. There is a promise to a river. I look at it and it seems to hold its secrets close, but somewhere deep within there is magic. Its dark pools and twists and turns are tantalising, and all my life I have wanted to learn what hides beneath the surface.

It’s a curiosity of nature and all that it holds. Like spotting the brilliant colours of a kingfisher flying past, my curiosity is piqued when there is a small movement in the stream, a rising brown trout breaking the surface. Concentric rings ripple out from where it must have eaten some insect. It sparkles for a brief moment as the sun reflects off its scales. One of the river’s secrets.

And like spotting a kingfisher and wanting to grab the binoculars to see it up close, I’m drawn to the trout. I want to see it again and perhaps then better understand this hidden world that contains such wonders, and connect with the animal soul that belongs to this stream.

Trout are beautiful jewels, scales glimmering gold with ruby spots, and they hold infinite curiosity to me. As I see it rising, I remember all that I have learnt over the years about rivers and the lives they support. I have learnt to see how the current shifts around bends and speeds up; how it’s pushed up and sideways by rocks and branches; and how deep hollows take the speed out of it. I’ve learnt where the trout likes to be, to save energy, stay protected and find food. I have learnt how the temperature shifts and gives life to mayflies and other insects. Their life cycles are as important to the trout and the river as the rocks and the twists and turns themselves. The way the larvae move and feed as nymphs; the temperature at which they molt and rise to the surface to hatch. And then how they begin their brief adult life after being given wings, one glorious day aloft in the sun, only to die shortly after, their life cycles complete.

I sit by the river and watch the place where the trout rose. I spot the mayflies drifting on the surface. Another one approaches the rock behind which the trout is hiding, and it too becomes a quick snack, as the smallest little plop makes it disappear into the trout’s mouth.

My curiosity eventually gets the better of me and I sneak up to the edge of the water and tie on a perfect mayfly imitation to my fly line. An insect made of string and feathers. I must hold all that I know of the river and its treasures in my mind before I cast my line out. I cast my mind out to the rocks, the currents below the surface, the insects in the water, and where I imagine the trout is hiding. I sense the movement and the energy of it all, the spirit of the river.

And if I’ve understood enough of it, then maybe the trout will rise. I let my imitation of nature drift along the stream. It sits on the surface like all the real mayflies around it, almost indistinguishable, drifting in the currents towards the partially hidden stone. The fly follows the twists and turns I have observed before casting it out; it’s pulled one way and then the other before gliding past the rock. And then the trout rises. The river has given me one of its treasured jewels to hold and observe for a short moment.

It’s the manifestation of my connection with the soul of the river.

It’s a thing of beauty and wonder. But it can only ever be fleeting because the act in itself hurts the world in its disturbance. It takes a toll on me and the trout. Flyfishing is a strange conflict within. To get to know the river and the trout, you know you are hurting it. But it is done out of curiosity; out of wanting connection and of loving the trout and the river it is in. It always feels wrong and a little selfish, but it also provides this deep and immense connection to the world that feels important.

So as the trout swims back, I breathe out again, the tension released. The trout glitters a final time before disappearing into the amber stream, perfectly blending back in against the pebbled river bed. It’s absorbed by the river, hidden in its embrace. Soon after, I spot it rising again, eating real mayflies. Not too rattled.

I say a quiet thank you to the river and the trout. And then I turn around and walk home as the sun drops lower in the sky, but never quite sets.

Thanks for reading this essay. Flyfishing has always been a way for me to connect with the natural world, but there has also always been a conflict in the fact that there is some harm to the fish. I know it can be controversial so I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments: have you ever tried it? What do you think about it?

Two big inspirations for this essay are the books Illuminated by Water by Malachy Tallack, and of course the timeless A River Runs Through It by Norman Maclean. Check them out if you are interested in more soulful nature writing on rivers and flyfishing.

If you enjoyed this, love nature writing and are as interested as I am in the richness and the soul-healing that comes from being out in nature, please subscribe below to join the community and receive the weekly newsletter.

There is now an option of a voluntary paid subscription. None of my writing will be locked behind paywalls, but if you enjoy what I do and want to support it so that I can keep writing, and keep Kismet afloat, a paid subscription is greatly appreciated.

As a thank you, paid members get access to the Captain’s Quarters (our private community chat) and a welcome package.

Subscribe now

This story is part of a set of themed essays around nature and finding belonging. You can read the other essays here:

After dinner I row ashore and stroll up along the shortest river in the UK, connecting fresh water Loch Coruisk — high above the anchorage — to the sea. I walk along in the half light of dusk, surrounded by steep rocks that fade into the distance, enshrouded by a light, misting rain. There are scattered boulders perched on top of rocks and hills everywhere, and some of the smooth, exposed rock I walk on is scored by deep gouges, the visible effects of the ice sheet that moved over these places millennia ago.

The veil between us and history feels thin here somehow. These rocks and isles have stood here longer than all human lifetimes. I sit for a moment and take it all in.

I’m thinking about time, place, colour and light, shifting my attention trying to perceive my surroundings. I notice the muted colours of this vista, a defining feature of these Scottish island landscapes. They have a wildness to them, seeming almost inhospitable.

There is a spectrum of greys in the rock faces and the smooth flowing ice-carved cliffs. Some lichens grow sparsely, reddish white, others pale yellow or ivory white. The grasses are green but not vibrant, dulled by beige and straw. Tiny purple flowers occasionally burst out of the heather.

The towering rocks of the Cuillins seem dark, brooding, almost black. But the constant mists wet the rocks, and when they catch the light they shine and sparkle, silver bright. The sea goes from a blue-green lagoon to obsidian black where the reflection of light and rock makes the surface opaque. The Scottish isles are uniquely beautiful. It is such a privilege to be able to sail here, and to see both the richness and scarcity of life.

As I sit overlooking the sea, with Loch Coruisk behind me and the ancient rocks and cliffs all around, I see the traces of time etched across the landscape. The rock I sit on is smoothed by the ice, lines etched deep by its movement, twenty thousand years ago. Grasses and plants, flowers, lichen and algae are scattered irregularly. The movements of time and water visible everywhere.

The sea shifts and changes as the tide moves in, driven by the sun and the moon and the Earth’s rotation in a solar system 4.6 billion years old. Flowing clouds shroud and change the landscape; the peaks seem to live in the heavens, always covered from view.

I think about the movement of water: the droplets in the clouds that cover these peaks, dripping down, eroding, collecting, until it flows down to the loch, and eventually the sea where it again evaporates and returns to cloud in a continuous cycle, seemingly eternal. But it will erode the rocks to nothing over time, and the minerals of those rocks wash out to sea and become part of algae, fish and us — sustaining life.

We are all part of Earth and it is also in us; all matter part of our one planet. Billions of years of evolution — based on those minerals and compounds — shaped all of us.

How foolish it seems to believe we are separate or different or not part of nature.

We are of Earth. That’s all we can be.

This is a journal entry from my time sailing around the West Coast of Scotland, and part of chapter 15 of my memoir about the trip.

If you enjoyed this, love nature writing and are as interested as I am in the richness and the soul-healing that comes from being out at sea or amongst mountains, please subscribe below to join the community and receive the weekly newsletter..

There is now an option of a voluntary paid subscription. None of my writing will be locked behind paywalls, but if you enjoy what I do and want to support it so that I can keep writing, and keep Kismet afloat, a paid subscription is greatly appreciated.

As a thank you, paid members get access to the Captain’s Quarters (our private community chat) and a welcome package.

Subscribe now

This story is part of a set of themed essays around nature and finding belonging. You can read the other essays here:

My journey into sailing came out of nowhere. No one in my family expected it, least of all me. And in many ways I took quite an unusual path, but it’s also one that anyone can follow.

Life at sea is wondrous, and I wish everyone could get to experience it, the way I love and know it. The feeling as the sails fill with wind and the boat surges forward with an energy that feels alive is otherworldly. The freedom to explore places only accessible by water, the complete solitude at anchor among seals and birds can’t be replicated any other way. But sailing is also about being exposed to the elements, sometimes balancing fear and wonder as wind and seas build to enormous proportions, and somehow the boat harnesses those forces at sea, moulds itself to their power, and surfs the invisible air currents. The thrill and magic of it, along with the solitude and freedom makes you return to sea again and again to experience it.

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The call of the sea

Everyone has their own journey into sailing. Many start early, through family sailing trips or dinghy racing. Others find it independently out of curiosity as a way to achieve a sense of freedom, and exploration at sea. I fall into the latter. I didn’t really sail until quite late, starting in my late 20s. I wanted to sail, to experience life at sea immersed in the elements. In chapter one of my memoir I share the story of the first day I considered it:

One day, after watching a show about the age of sail, an idea came into my mind like a gust of wind, and it fanned into life a roaring fire from embers I didn’t know were aglow. From a simple thought – I wonder what sailing is like? – my life shifted onto a completely different track.

I went to sea for a weekend of cruising through my university sailing club and I fell in love. It was mid-March, charcoal skies and howling winds, throwing rain and sea spray in our faces as we were tossed by choppy waves in the Solent. We were somewhere between Southampton and the Isle of Wight on our way to the Needles. Despite myself – despite the cold, damp wintery grey – I fell in love with the feeling of flying over the sea with the wind, feeling the boat heave and move, punching through waves on this cold spring weekend.

It was a fluke really, a chance decision that got me into sailing. And then I took every chance I could get to do more of it, initially through the university club and then almost immediately I went on to learn through the RYA courses: day-skipper and yachtmaster.

Learning the ropes (the cheap way)

But what really taught me — and the only way to really learn — was simply time on the water. It was hard at first finding opportunities to crew, to get chances to sail more. It turns out not many people have access to sailing yachts. Or at least it’s hard when you don’t know where to go. Then it suddenly isn’t: you realise there are little boats and people who sail them everywhere, and most of them are happy to take you sailing.

For roughly the cost of a netflix subscription, anyone can join their local sailing or yacht club, where there are always opportunities to learn and get time on the water, by crewing for others as they sail.

So that’s what I did. A few years after that first day of sailing in the Solent, I joined my local club and started crewing. My very first sail with another club member was five days non-stop from Edinburgh to Gothenburg, crossing the North Sea. A tale for another post. I’m not suggesting everyone should do what I did — it’s worth starting small and building up to trans-sea-passages — but it’s worked out brilliantly for me.

I also started sailing with the organisation Sail Britain. Cruising the coasts of Scotland aboard Oliver’s ship Merlin has been one of the most amazing ways to experience sailing alongside like-minded people (who are also learning for the first time) and a way to make friends who sail.

Between the people I’ve met through Sail Britain and my local club, I have had the chance to do multiple crossings of the North Sea, cruise the west coast of Scotland, sail from Northern Ireland to Mallaig, and do a mid-winter passage of the Bay of Biscay, all as crew, completely free. I could never have expected all of this five years ago.

And then eventually I was given a boat for free.

How I found my boat Kismet

Then brave Kismet, northward bound we sailed!
Across great seas, through Scotland’s heart out west.
You carried us through lochs as deep as time,
To feel Atlantic spray upon the wind,

(lines from my recent ode to Kismet: A Wounded Bird)

Not long after I joined my local yacht club a boat was up for sale. But as it needed a lot of work and didn’t sell, I met with the owner and expressed my interest in restoring her. I didn’t have any experience as a boat owner, just a bit of sailing and a day skipper, but despite all of that he decided to give me his boat for free. I’ll be eternally grateful to him for changing the course of my life. And grateful to Kismet for carrying me all around Scotland.

I wrote about the experience of getting Kismet here:

Free boats are not a rare occurrence. Old, seaworthy boats needing work are often surprisingly hard to sell. So you’ll have to do the work. They’re free for a reason. But I can say from experience that it is worth it. After restoring Kismet and sailing around Scotland I’m now here, and it’s changed my life.

What you should do if you want to sail

So if you, like me, find yourself curious about sailing, yearning for freedom and nature, join a local sailing club. Sign up to crew, get out on the water, and maybe you too will find the joy and hardship of a free boat some day.

Organisations like Sail Britain offer an incredible alternative — allowing you to experience a week of coastal cruising alongside like-minded people. It is a space where a joint crew of experienced and novice sailors learn by doing and exploring remote Scottish isles and sea lochs together.

Additionally, there are dedicated crewing websites for bigger passages, where people crossing oceans look for helping hands. It’s a great way to build miles and get serious sailing experience.

If you are curious and would like to know more drop a comment down below, or message me.

I write weekly stories about my voyage: exploring life adrift, mental health, and recovering from burnout along the windswept shores of Scotland. To join the crew and support my writing please subscribe below.

And it’s inspired me to write a poem, a little ode to Kismet who carried us through it all.

When we were out sailing I kept thinking back to the epic imagery of Moby-Dick and Paradise Lost, especially as we navigated autumn storms around Cape Wrath, and the massive tides of the Pentland Firth. The themes of chaos and treacherous, vicious storms from those stories seemed appropriate as we sailed through some very rough, unforgiving seas.

I love these lines from Paradise Lost so much I included the quote in my book. It’s describing the voyage from Hell to earth across Chaos, with vivid seascape imagery.

If only we could all write like Milton… Alas.

But inspired by this, I’ve put together a poem for Kismet about our whole voyage. It’s written in blank verse in four stanzas. It’s inspired by the feel and imagery of the great epic blank verse poems like Ulysses, Paradise Lost, and The Odyssey.

A Wounded Bird

A broken boat with folded sails, alone
As winter frosts descend, abandoned here,
A gothic city’s yard of former glory.
Asleep on iron keels you yearned for seas
Remote in weary age, yet wanting more.
You dreamt to bound atop the waves again,
Beyond the Firth of Forth, and farther more.
You dreamt of distant shores and deep sea lochs, 
Among the rugged isles that guard the west.
But here ‘til now, your heart seized up, corroded.
Decayed, your courage lacking spark and verve.
A hull that’s dulled by years and miles gone by,
A wounded bird ashore, so far from life,
Away from lochs and isles and dolphin kin,
And far removed from dying dreams of yore. 

And then by kindred soul discovered here,
A sailor seeking Kismet and escape.
I wanted too what’s in your dreams, the wild
And sun-soaked west; to nestle in amongst
The ancient Cuillins looming over Skye,
And sail across the sea below the grace 
Of gulls and gannets gliding high above.
Our stories now aligned and intertwined,
As work began to build your heart and brain,
To give you courage and restore my soul,
Through winters chill we laboured long and hard.
And then came spring, with puffins swift return,
And warming sun as sails were raised again.

Then brave Kismet, northward bound we sailed! 
Across great seas, through Scotland’s heart out west.
You carried us through lochs as deep as time,
To feel Atlantic spray upon the wind, 
Then further still our journey went, past Mull 
And Skye with dolphins as our welcome guides.
Across the Scottish sea, new worlds emerged,
Far west as you can go. As autumn winds
Approached, again across a sea we sailed.
In Assynt ancient peaks stood watch alone,
Behind the pebbled shores in wispy clouds 
Enshrouded, there they pondered aeons past.

Then stormy Cape of Wrath and fear approached.
You brought us bravely forth again through gales,
And waves and roaring tides – bewinged souls,
Beneath the ancient skies by end of land.
Afloat through churning maelstroms, rushing past,
Through rearing waves that broke across our bow,
Abound for home, due south, and winter’s rest.
A grand adventure dreamt and sailed as one,
Reborn with life anew you soared and flew,
Before the winds across the sea with me –
Two birds no longer wounded, but made whole.

I love the rhythm and epic scale of blank verse, and have really enjoyed trying to capture the vivid imagery of seascapes and sailing, enhanced through its undulating pace. I hope it comes across.

If you enjoyed this poem, please consider liking, commenting and subscribing. Your support helps a lot as I work toward bringing my stories into the world.

Then, some cosmic luck intervened and came to my rescue. I was given a small, 50-year-old deteriorating boat for free, by someone who had given up on sailing, annual maintenance and B(ring).O(ut).A(nother).T(housand) life.

Her name was Kismet, meaning destiny. It felt like the universe was telling me something.

I was, at the time, a DIY novice who couldn’t tell an angle grinder from a jigsaw nor an alternator from a starter motor. I was also starting to experience severe burnout. Nine times out of ten that’s a combo that leads to a rapid loss of money and boat within a year.

But somehow the opposite happened. It didn’t happen all at once, but slowly at first. A year into ownership I was beginning to learn new things, and solve problems with the view of having more comfort and safety out sailing. A very motivating cause and effect. And Kismet did need a lot of work. When I got her, the old diesel engine would only deign to start every two or three times, the batteries and electronics were questionable at best, and a fire hazard at worst, and years of accumulated paint and growth on the hull—and mould and damp inside—meant that she was… unpleasant to sail.

It’s a very overwhelming feeling realising that what’s wrong on the boat is everything. But she was solidly built, a very sturdy hull, spacious for her size, and a capable cruising boat. I felt she had potential. And she was free, so what’s the worst that could happen?

(read my previous post (Alone at Sea) about nearly losing my mast in the North Sea for an answer to that question)

So I started learning about diesel engines, checking parts and reading manuals, eventually taking it all apart and rebuilding it myself. The electrics all came out and I rewired the boat, new safe batteries, LED lights and general modern comforts. I bought new power tools, finally learning how useful (and fun) an angle grinder is.

The drama and details of spending a winter rebuilding an engine in a cold shed is a story for another post, but to my surprise I found that having this project to work on—learning new skills, working with my hands, and having clear ambitions and goals for the project—proved healing in and of itself. I’d spent so much time fretting and questioning what to do next as I delved deeper into burnout, that the healing qualities of grimy engine work came as a surprise.

A free boat isn’t really free; it came at the cost of aches and pains and many hours of grime, as well as parts and tools, but ultimately I have spent less than even if I’d gotten a cheap beater car (not that Kismet can take me to the supermarket for the weekly shop). And the boat maintenance and DIY skills (not to mention all the new tools) are still coming in handy on an almost daily basis. And Kismet is transformed.

Looking back it does seem like destiny. Kismet carried us around all of Scotland in 2025, through the Caledonian Canal and out west. We sailed with dolphins, basking sharks, puffins, and sea eagles; we crossed seas, slept under the aurora and witnessed some of the most incredible night skies of my life. And ultimately it led me here, and to writing my memoir, and to being healed of burnout.

So thank you Kismet, for saving my soul.

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Prologue

I am alone at sea in my small sailboat after leaving Edinburgh at first light, and am now somewhere east of St Andrews. I am in search of something, or perhaps trying to escape as I sail my little ship Kismet – a twenty-three-foot sloop – single-handed for the first time. I’m seeking adventures along the coast, heading north to see how far I can make it – an ambitious trip for so small a ship. The azure sky is filled with gannets, gracefully cruising in search of food, and in the water, puffins drift lazily, their colourful beaks reflected in the still surface. I’m trying to make my way to Stonehaven, a few hours further north, with tide and wind.

As I close my eyes and let the movement of the boat carry me, I sense the power of the elements that move me. I feel the ceaseless power of the tide that flows like a great oceanic river, carrying me north, and the tentative brush of wind, fickle and unpredictable. It is calm now, but these forces are like great, wilful spirits of the earth, and they are in charge of life at sea. If they so choose, there is no fighting, nor harnessing their inexorable power, one can just hope to endure.

But occasionally, like now, they let you in, allow you to coexist in their domain, and in a small sailboat borrow some of their power. And when tide and wind and waves all harmonise with your little ship there are moments like this: a union of pure magic. In this union is the truest form of peace that I know: it is when I become one with the rhythm of the sea, of the regular movement of the waves and tides, and when the gusts and lulls of the wind flow and merge and become an extension of my senses.

This feeling is what I am searching for as I keep sailing northward, bow pointed towards Orkney and Shetland. But unfortunately, the wind has just died and it’s drawing late into the afternoon. The sails are flapping gently in the occasional breeze. I go down below to make myself an early dinner in the light of the setting sun. I’m at peace in my little ship, enjoying the solitude, and the distance to land based life; enjoying being surrounded by sea and birds, far from it all. I turn the stove on and start preparing some pasta.

I’m eating down below when I sense our movement changing; the wind is finally picking up. It hums in the rigging as we start surging forward. I quickly finish the food and climb back out on deck to take control of the tiller. We are sailing! We are picking up speed and the bow is splitting the water into two waves, leaving a long wake that merges into the wavelets behind us.

The wind rapidly increases in the dusky evening light, and the rigging and sails are straining under its force. I’ll need to reduce sail before something breaks. But as I go to furl away my headsail, something is wrong: it’s completely jammed. A lump of fear grows in the pit of my stomach. I try again, but no matter how much I coax and pull, it won’t budge. I scramble up on deck and head to the bow, carefully balancing as I walk in the increasingly difficult conditions. I’m trying to get the sail mechanism free, yanking and twisting with increasing desperation and force, but nothing is helping. Then snap! A bolt breaks and the whole forestay, which is holding up the mast, comes off from the bow. Shit! Somehow the mast is still standing, but the forestay is swaying wildly, risking serious damage. My hands are shaking as adrenaline surges through me and I try to hold on to the swaying stay.

For a moment I look out behind me. The sky is caught in a vivid orange, as the setting sun blazes through the atmosphere, and the beauty of it stuns me. Then, the sail is whipped furiously by a strong gust, and I’m almost thrown over the side by the force of it. With perilous effort I wrestle the mass of canvas and lash it around the forestay. I tie it down to the bow rail so it doesn’t swing around and break the mast, and can finally sit down and take a few deep breaths.

What do I do now?

I’m paralysed, unable to think. I glance up and suddenly remember my new halyard, a rope running the length of the mast. Perfect! I free it and attach it to the bow. It’ll hold the mast in place for now. I walk back to the cockpit on shaky legs, and prepare to start the engine. It is a reluctant relic, an old corroded piece of metal that works unreliably. If it doesn’t start, I’ll have to call the coastguard for a rescue. I press down the starter button as if my life depends on it, and the engine turns impotently, chugging along, as the battery slowly drains. Ten seconds… twenty seconds… thirty.

Come on, please…

Then, by some miracle, it finally comes alive, its metallic beat a steady reassurance that I will be able to make it back home. I’m just past Arbroath after twelve hours of sailing out of Edinburgh, and all I can do is turn around and sail into the approaching night, defeated.

As darkness descends, I motor back towards home, with a broken ship and a broken spirit. This was meant to be my first serious sailing adventure single-handed, and I have already failed, on the very first day. As the sun goes down, so goes my last ray of comfort and hope. In the dark of night, alone on the North Sea in my little ship I suddenly feel so small and helpless, at the whim of the awesome powers of the increasing wind and waves as they toss me like a cork in a bathtub; a lonely little boat on a stormy sea.

I motor through the dark night, shivering, cold and exhausted from a lack of sleep, as I peer into the darkness, avoiding lobster pots, shallows and fishing vessels. I’m hallucinating shapes and creatures in the dark, just outside the edge of my vision. It feels like a fever dream; my brain losing track of reality as tiredness starts breaking the barrier of my mind and I fight to stay awake. The droning of the engine seems to consume reality as I blip in and out of consciousness, unsure of where I am and what is real.

In the early morning, after endless hours of fighting sleep, a small band of light finally appears on the horizon, and as it grows brighter it dispels some of the cold misery in my mind. Eventually the sun rises, and with its warming, reassuring presence some hope and energy returns. I’m still afloat, engine still running and the mast still stands.

As I approach Edinburgh twenty-four hours after leaving, the engine starts coughing and hacking, despite having a nearly full tank. She gives up her last sputtering cough and dies just as I pass the breakwater into the harbour. I only just manage to drift onto the pontoon and moor up again with the help of some friendly sailors that help catch my mooring lines. I immediately head down below and fall asleep, exhausted. A few hours later I return home, any hope of further sailing this season extinguished. Rigging broken, engine broken, my little ship barely functioning, my dream of a sailing adventure dashed by the capricious North Sea. I’m sorry, Kismet. We weren’t ready

In writing this memoir I initially had decided against a prologue. I wanted real-time continuity from page one until the end, allowing readers to be a part of the adventure the whole time. From me quitting my job and then fixing up my boat Kismet, until we set sail and circumnavigated Scotland, and then eventually returned, weatherworn and wiser for it.

But as I was editing after my first draft I realised the tone of the story is very different in part one, which deals with the burnout, quitting a job and working in a yard during cold winter nights to fix an engine and a broken boat. The rest of the story is about the sailing adventure: the waves and wind and wild; the drama and difficulties of sailing, as well as the beauty of it. So I thought I’d try writing a prologue of a short failed trip a year before the start of the main story in the memoir. The prologue sets a vivid scene and tone more similar to later in the book and hopefully brings readers in through the more immediate action. And I quite like it, I think it’s effective, and hopefully it works to draw readers in and give them more of an idea for what to expect from the whole memoir.

I would love to hear your thoughts around the pros and cons of prologues in both fiction and narrative non-fiction. Did this prologue draw you in and make you curious to read more? Let me know why or why not!

Please like and comment below if you enjoyed this first glimpse of my upcoming memoir, and subscribe for future posts.

New Beginnings

Hello and welcome to my Substack “Soulfaring”. A year ago I walked away from a career in biomedical research to rediscover who I am after an extended fight with burnout and depression. I felt my soul had withered away and I had lost myself. So I rebuilt an old sailboat I had been given for free (read about it here) and set sail around Scotland to spend time in nature and let myself heal. I thought of that journey as a sail to save my soul and this writing project is the continuation of my attempt to heal and rediscover who I am and what I want to do. Over the last year I’ve written a memoir about the journey I’ve been on. About the creeping debilitation of burnout, and lifelong feelings of having to prove myself to the world. In chapter one of my memoir I share the feeling:

Writing this memoir has been a transformative experience. In future posts I will share more about what that has been like, but it has made me remember how much I love writing and storytelling. I’ve realised I write to better understand myself and the world, and by sharing my own writing—the ideas that drive and shape it, the joy and difficulties in putting pen to paper—I want to connect with others to better understand my place in this world and to gain a richer experience in exploring it.

What You Will Find here at Soulfaring

This substack is a creative outlet for personal writing exploration. This is where I post glimpses and snippets of ongoing projects (currently my memoir, read the prologue) but also other things including poems, nature essays and short stories that I am working on for my own enjoyment. As I get closer to publishing I also want to share the failures and successes along the way to getting published.

Here is a recent meditative, lyrical essay on rivers:

Occasionally, I also probe my own writing process: explore how I think about and understand structure, prose, rhythm and storytelling as a whole. I am infinitely fascinated by the subtle and constant decisions that shape and mould the stories I write, and also the stories I enjoy reading.

Join the Crew

So if you love nature writing and are as interested as I am in the richness and the soul-healing that comes from being out in nature, please subscribe. I’ll invite you to breathe in the salty sea air, the rich mossy air of an ancient forest, or the sweet peat of a river, and bring you along on adventures in the wild.

I want this to be a sanctuary for everyone who loves nature and the written word. A space where we can collectively explore life, connection, mental health, and purpose through the lens of writing and stories. Where we can all get a sense of belonging as creatures of earth and water.

Please take a moment to read some of my other posts, see the sights, breathe the air, and share your own thoughts in the comments. I love to hear all the different perspectives on life from the people that stop by to read. Drop a hello below, let me know where in the world you are reading this, and where you find your own peace in nature.

Fair winds,

Alexander Gunnarsson

May 2026

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